You Can Switch Classes on the Fly in 'Mass Effect: Andromeda'

Gone are the days of being locked into game-long Infiltrator or Vanguard.

It used to be that Mass Effect players were locked into whatever class they’d selected for their Commander Shepard for an entire game, but it appears that there’s going to be a lot more flexibility in the next installment. A new gameplay trailer for Mass Effect: Andromeda dropped on Thursday, and it offers a closer look at the player’s new squadmates and the reveal that now gamers can switch classes on the fly.

The first video in this series focused on the slick new combat system, specifically weapons and character movements. But the latest one confirms that players will have access to every ability. So yes, you can now create a black hole to suck in enemies with a biotic Singularity and then burn them all up with Flamethrower, a tech ability.

Traditional Mass Effect classes like Infiltrator and Vanguard are now relegated to “profiles” that players can unlock after accessing a certain number of pre-requisite abilities. They’ll offer perks — like increased Tech or Biotic Recharge — and special abilities like Biotic Blink, a teleport evasion maneuver to complement your jet pack movements.

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Best of all, players will be able to shift between four different preset loadouts on the fly, each of which includes up to three active abilities and a profile (at the expense of a reasonable cooldown reset). Squadmate abilities can and will complement these loadouts.

In previous games, the best you could do was borrow a single special ability from a squadmate to round out Shepard’s arsenal of abilities to balance things out, but now? The possibilities for your Pathfinder will be nigh endless.

Check out the new video below for more details on Combat Profiles & Squads: